Idolator
It's a good week for dual-personality albums on the Billboard 200: T.I.'s T.I. Vs. T.I.P. debuted at the top spot, selling a whopping 468,000 copies and, no doubt, thrilling both sides of the Atlanta rapper's brain. Right behind T.I.'s album was its tween-set equivalent, Hannah Montana 2, which took a 42% sales hit and sold 188,000 copies in the U.S. last week.
Biggest Debuts: Velvet Revolver's Libertad entered the chart at No. 5, selling 92,000 copies to hard-rock fans around the country; right behind it was the long-delayed album from former Destiny's Child singer Kelly Rowland, Ms. Kelly, which moved 82,000 units. At No. 21 was the soundtrack to Transformers, which got picked up by 32,000 fanboys around the country.
Notable Jumps: Peter Bjorn & John's Writer's Block saw a 21% increase in sales—going from 3,900 to 4,700 units sold—while still-catchy-after-all-these-months "Young Folks" leapt 9% on the digital tracks chart, selling 6,600 copies. Was there a mass click-a-thon on music-blog archives from last fall somewhere?
Charting The Decline: Album sales totaled 8.73 million this week, a 1.1% dip from last week's total—and a 3% drop from total album sales at this time last year, when the No. 1 album was Johnny Cash's American V: A Hundred Highways. That album's chart-topping total: 88,000 copies.
Nickelback Award For Inexplicable Durability: Fergie inched up to No. 11, selling 52,000 copies of The Dutchess on a 16% sales jump. If she keeps this up, she's going to be back in the top 10 soon, and you know what that means—more incentive for companies to give her ridiculous endorsement deals. It's almost enough to make you wish for a new Nickelback single.
T.I. Is Top Dog Again On The Billboard 200 [Billboard]
Comments
Props to T.I. - whatever you think of the album (and god knows, most critics and hip-hop-heads don't think much of it), his week-one sales were only 10% off the first week of King last year. Fitty is praying he comes that close when he drops Curtis. (Of course, with The Massacre dropping to 1.3m in early '05 before the hip-hop implosion, he doesn't have a prayer.)
The big sales for PB&J were clearly motivated by the big iTunes sale you guys pipped last week. The album's there at $6.99 now. I wonder if it did similar things for LCD Soundsystem?
@dennisobell: It didn't. Hot Chip, though, saw an 88% sales jump!
Am I the only person who had no idea who T.I. was until yesterday? And I work for a record label. Sheesh.
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